WEST IS NOT THE ROUTE FOR HARTFORD

A couple of weeks ago, I said Hartford needed an entrepreneur, someone who could close a deal, to get downtown moving again.

This prompted a letter-writing campaign by friends of Andy West suggesting West for the job.

I think not.

West was the guy who did the long-distance charity jogging in the late '70s. Since then he's been involved in a number of ventures. Lately he's been trying to become, as a member of the Downtown Council put it, the CEO of downtown renewal.

He has a plan for housing, a plan for the empty lots and a billion-dollar plan to rebuild downtown. Plans in this town are a dime a dozen. The question is whether West is the man to implement them.

West's track record was left mostly on the track. Since he gave up running more than a decade ago, he's been fired from several jobs and been involved in a number of businesses' failures.

The most notable was a magazine called Greater Hartford Business, in 1986. West was canned as publisher after the first issue. He claims he was illegally removed by the board of directors even though he owned 75 percent of the company. Others involved say he owned 10 percent to 20 percent of the company and was mismanaging it. It folded eight months later.

Five years ago, West conjured the idea for PlazaWest, a 2,000-unit housing and retail complex in downtown Hartford. He raised $375,000 from investors. One, Angelo Della Ripa of South Windsor, is suing him, claiming that West misappropriated his $100,000 investment and used it for other than corporate purposes. West denies this.

The project is on hold, lacking only the land and financing.

West acknowledges that he hasn't had many successes or made much money. He says he mostly lives on money he borrows from friends.

West says an entrepreneur should get credit for trying, even if a project never happens. Perhaps.

An entrepreneur must inspire trust. Charlene Moran trusted West when the two decided to go into a typesetting business in 1985.

Moran says the deal was that she would give West a check for

$3,000, and he'd then give a check to a leasing company for a typesetting machine. She says in a sworn statement that West's check bounced twice, meaning he'd used her money for something else. Moran still hasn't gotten most of her money back.

West denies any impropriety. "There's risk in investment," he said. "If you want a sure return, go to the bank." It's important for a downtown entrepreneur to have roots in the community. West keeps getting uprooted. He has been evicted from two Hartford apartments in the past three years, one a penthouse in Park Place Towers and another at Whitman Court, for nonpayment of rent.

West was the manager of Whitman Court, two buildings between Capitol Avenue and Buckingham Street. The owners allege that West couldn't produce receipts to cover money he supposedly spent on the buildings. West says that he had receipts, and that he is owed money.

An entrepreneur must get along with authorities. A year ago, West ran a show featuring male exotic dancers at the Elks Club in Webster, Mass. He hired local police for security, then didn't pay them, according to Det. William Keefe, who added, "Say, do you have this guy's phone number?" West says the show was put on by a restaurant he was working for, the Point Breeze Restaurant. "That's crazy," said the restaurant's lawyer, David Tiberi. "Why would a restaurant have a show someplace else and give up the bar business?" He added that the restaurant fired West and has a claim against him for $10,000 in missing goods and improper appropriation of funds.

West denies any wrongdoing, and says the restaurant owes him money.

Now, West says he has put together a million dollars worth of free labor and materials from local unions and suppliers, and is ready to use them to help build things on the empty lots in downtown Hartford. If he has marshaled free help for downtown -- the extent of it is unclear -- shame on the officials who should have done it. But that doesn't mean West should take over.

West is a hustler; attractive, persuasive, street-smart and energetic. He may hit it big someday. But officials should wait until he succeeds in one project -- a smaller town, a building, a lemonade stand, whatever -- before giving him any responsibility in downtown Hartford.